SH5: The good, the bad, and the ugly
 

Well, ive been mulling over this for the last week, so here's my "review" of Sh5, off the cuff with no rough draft or other formal writing procedures one would follow to write a genuine article, just Duci shooting straight from the hip!


The Good...
Maestro, cue the music!

Graphics
Lets get this one out of the way. This game has eye candy in spades, which is no surprise, but it has impressed me.


Campaign
This is one of the biggest strong points of SH5. I like how the campaign missions have continuity and you feel like your contributing to a larger effort.
It's not just "go here, patrol this long, and come home" anymore. I found myself thinking about the larger stategic picture. In the past, it has been said by one (if i remember his words right) that you can have all the technical details right, but if the campaign isn't good, it doesn't really amount to much. SH5 delivers a knock out punch here.

On a side note I was particuarlly impressed when 6 destroyers shows up off the eastern britsh coast when i cut loose with a deck gun on a target that couldn't see me.


Crew Management
This is also one of SH5's stronger points. The developers have definintly learned from their previous games. Crew management in SH3 was a tedious exercise of moving widgets around the boat. in Sh4 it was pretty much a hands off affair and which had the side effect of keeping you at distance. In Sh5, your directly involved in a way that draws you in and creates a situation where you have to make decisions, and plan things out a little, in a way that i did not find tedious. Infact, i felt rather engaged with it.


The Interior
I have to admit, in the past, i didn't see much point in it. I wanted it, but could go without it if i had to. It is well done, and i do find myself feeling like im really on a submarine. I've always felt that feeling immersed, (not at the expense of functionality) is a large portion of a submarine sim, and SH5 has this in spades.



The "minimalist" UI
Say what you want, but i like the minimalist themeof the UI. There is something to be said about a UI that gives you information in a non intrusive way. I find it a welcome departure from the same ole same ole.

Note: I said theme of the UI, i'll take more about the UI further down.


Small improvements sneaking through the cracks
There are small things that are really great, but their minute that most will probably miss. Things like the Travel mode button (this is a godsend!), Rec manual filter (another god send, i hate flipping through umpteen pages), and a leaderboard, which is unfortunatly tied with DRM.

The leaderboard is great because you can see other "captains" at sea and how their doing. Gives me the impression, "hey, im not the only one out here, and look how So and So is doing!" If you recognize some of the names, it kinda develops more community i think.

Another small thing that escapes attention, but got the attention of LukeFF, was that guns, and conning towers, cause drag now. This is sim stuff here!! But its under the vaneer where you can't see it. Other improvements were increased use of compressed air. I love that! In sh3 and Sh4, compressed air may as well not have existed, but it is noticeable in a small degree in SH5. I also like the new captains log in how it keeps track of all occurrences instead of just ships sunk.

One more item is adjustments to the AI settings. Never before have you been able to establish a minmal visual threshold for night time seperate from the day time. It was always a fixed percentage. Now you can adjust it THIS IS HUGE.. Everyones always complained on why you can't just get right in with the convoys at night on the surface and be wtihin the close distances described in firsthand accounts... now you can!


Modablity
It has improved from previous titles. This is undeniable, and has to be mentioned.

The overall concept
The overall concept of this game, isn't a submarine simulation. It's changed from previous games. It is now a submarine captain simulation, as opposed to a strict technical simulation. This is not to say that the tactical, and technical elements are no longer there, they are, and have improved a little in detail under the hood of the game (as mentioned above).

One philopshy ive always had, particuarlly in my moddings, is that the player, as the captain, should be forced to make decisions. Your decisions mean life, or death, failure or victory for your boat and your crew. This game delivers that in a way i really like.


Overall potential
It's huge. Very huge, but it will take alot of time, and a whole new generation of modders. I might be mistaken, but i think alot of the "old guard" is worn out. I know i am.


The bad...
Maestro, cue the music!

The usual bugs & unfiinished state
I have to say this is no surprise to me. I've set the bar pretty low for Ubisoft, but this bears mentioning anyway. This is bad, but not UGLY because the game is in far better condition then SH4 was when it was launched. Some things should not have to be fixed by mod, but i will degress one point, that in working on a supermod, i have come to understand why some of these bugs get through. The things that bug me the most, are animation related.


World of Subcraft
Crew skills. Some of them are atrociously gamey and placed in the wrong place. A navigator that can increase my crush depth? Thankfully half of them make sense, but the other half deserve negative marks.


Post 43 Type 9
No, that isn't some piece of equipment. I understand that much attention to deliver what was delivered in the level of detail aspired, but the lack of at least a Type9B and Type9C is a negative in my book, and the war did not end in 43. Even though post 43 for the Kreigsmarine was tantamount to pissing in the wind, it should be there. I also put this as a negative, as it's a great "work around" from a developers point of view from having to work out all the technical upgrades and the campaign with a deadline looming large. In other words, I see what you did there ubi!



Game performance

Granted this is variable by end user machines, but im really bummed those shadows slow my machine to a crawl. Very pretty, but the overhead is massive. Other then that, some slowdowns, but nothing major.


The ugly...
Maestro, cue the music!

Missing functionality, a tale of the runaway deck gun.
While the minamlist theme UI is great, the lack of functionality is one of the.. no. it's THE biggest c**kblocker from enjoying this game. The lack of access to underlying functionality makes the game teeth gnashing obtuse.

So there i was, ghosting in for a night surface attack on a destroyer. Switching between UZO and biinoculars. Meaning to "lock" onto the destroyer, i pressed the space bar. Unfortunatly i did this while looking in the binoculars and not the UZO. The deck gun immediately started opening fire. Try as i might, i could not get them to cease fire by any means available to me except diving. Speeding away at maximum speed, the deck gun crew kept shooting. Eventually i noticed 5 other destroyers coming into the area. Thankfully, the "target" hadn't zeroed in on me yet. I had to shut this deck gun crew up soon, or else i would be spotted very shortly. The only option i had left was to dive. It was the only way to stop this.
Ugly.. pure ugly.


Unresolved base level bugs from SH4
Not gonna get into this too much, except that a couple huge bugs from SH4 that i would think would be the very first thing to do before bulding any new game on top of it didn't get fixed. Such as:

- The soundman not reporting "Depth charges in the water" doesn't appear to be working, (edited for clarity)

- depth keeping is still an issue.

- crew not switching to wet weather gear in high winds regardless of what you put in the cfg files. Rain only, rough seas, no. This also effects being able to man guns in heavy seas. They ALWAYS will because the limiting variable that says "seas too rough" is broken.

Insane, and Draconian Digital Rights Management.

'nuff said. This what is ultimatly dragging this game into the toilet.



I offer no final verdict, only what i see as good, bad, and ugly.

Maybe the most honest review (if you wanna call it that) on Silent Hunter 5 yet.

I said it before: I like it, but I see why people may dislike it. It really depends on the player this time, I think.

Pretty much sums up my thoughts, good post.

Sums it up pretty well there, reading between the lines as to cut a long story short, Nice graphics, plenty of potential far too many bugs and DRM well nuf said. Nice review.

very fair and balanced review. I would pretty much agree with it as is.

Another improvement I would mention is the fact that you can now see how the AI sensors operate with map updates "on". This makes it much easier to see what the AI sees as well as tweak it and mod it. It should make the process of making the AI more aggressive without being un-realistic much more accurate than was ever possible before.

Bravo Ducimus, you have written exactly how I feel about this game. Well thought out synopsis!

Regards.

Good explanation. Thanks for that.

:yeah: for the songs!

Ducimus wrote that your actions influence the 'grander scheme of things', how does this actually work?

This is something that interests me, and sort of keeps me from fully going back to the ol' reliable SH3. Would be nice to have a realistic and dynamic world, and a kind of randomness that didn't really exist in SH3. Every sunken ship would have cargo and that would effect the transports etc.

Edit. Good review, and also thanks to Ducimus for modding SH3.

Excellent review

Thanks for the review.

All in all, this is exciting. I'm holding off on buying the game until it is more polished, more mods are out, and (hopefully) the DRM is removed. But I will buy it.

The stuff you list in the Good section is great stuff that I'm really glad to hear is in there. It sounds like if they can clean up the other issues it will be a really solid product.

Interesting reading...I must admit to not knowing what to expect when I opened the thread http://www.psionguild.org/forums/ima...ies/pirate.gif

Best review yet. Exactly what I'd expect from a top community chap. The funny thing is, I can see through all the jaded cynicism that, tired or not, you're going to keep going.

You should have mentioned more bad elements. The song theme was too long, so it still played when I was finished reading about the bad parts... :03::D

Otherwise it seems balanced. I don't have the game yet, so it's nice to read.

good review, many valid points

WOW Ducimus. That was outstanding. I honestly thought you were going to rip the game to shreds...well balanced and honest review IMO :yeah:

Great review. Pretty straight forward and unemotional. I do have two questions I would like answered

What is this mode and what does it do?

This makes my brain stem hurt. Could you edit this for a bit more clarity for the slow kids in the back of the room?

Thanks for taking the time to write a pretty good balanced review of SHV. I have bought it but have not installed it yet.

Excellent reading.
Excellent OST.
:salute:

How is that a good review in any sense of the word?
Graphics are expected to be better given the time separation from SH4.
Crew interaction is going to get VERY old when you are clicking through the same stupid 4 dialogue options your 10th time through the campaign. I dont see how people think this is a cool feature. Maybe the first 2 times through the game. Do you really care what happened to his brother if you have read the same dialogue 24 times before? Its just going to be a gamey/artificial, go here, click talk to this guy, rapidly click through all the tedious conversation, just to get your morale bonus and then go back to actually playing the game. 0 morale bug. Nuff said. Destroyers that artificially 'lock' onto your position and maintain that relative location no matter if you stop, go slow, turn or go fast... even if there is an island in their way. If I stop, they should try to close for the kill. Nuff said. What about sinking 5 (or was it 7) Brit carriers in one patrol? What the hell is that? How many do they have? :06:

The only thing that I agree (again, improved graphics are to be expected) is that the campaign seems more engaging. Seems pretty sad that this is the only positive this game has going for it.

The remainder is rife with bugs and crazy design decisions that just make my jaw drop.

Platapus, travel mode is a new feature that allows you to keep a hi-TC without being dropped out whenever you receive a new radio message/contact report. Great when you want to cross the Atlantic.


One of the great things about SH5 is the many improvements under the hood that are not immediately apparent, for example improvements to the mission editor and the campaign engine, some of them are discused here:


http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=163364